I just want to say that I also think this would be a very useful feature. Actually, I'd like to see each work on here packaged as a '.zip' bundling all files in the submission along with a 'README.txt' file stating the author(s) and license(s) for the work as well as any attribution instructions. It'd be great to toss a copy of any of the relevant licenses (eg. CC-BY-3.0.txt', etc) in there too.
This is how I have packaged the works I have published on here and I think it makes a nice tidy bundle for anyone who downloads it. As it stands, it's very easy to download a bunch of pngs, etc. and completely lose track of who made them or how they are licensed. Similar to madmccoy, I have developed my own little system for keeping track of this stuff but it would be cool if the site automated the process a little since it has all the relevant information to do so.
Of course, I'm guessing such a process goes against the submission framework used by the site, but hey one can only dream right? maybe a stretch goal on the paetron?
if you are on vacay or just sick of talking about license stuff, I understand and sorry in advance for being a pest, but do I have warn you I plan to keep pinging here until I get a reply ;)
@all: Just to circle back to the original topic and close out this thread, I want to clarify that following surt's advice, I will refrain from pinging contributors about the difference between CC-BY and OGA-BY unless they explicitly mention being new to licensing or request help understanding the different licenses.
Per eugeneloza suggestion, I have opened a separate forum topic to discuss how to improve the licensing FAQ on OGA to help folks better understand the different licenses at the time of submission.
thanks all for your thoughts!
@claudeb: thanks for the pointer re: file formats, hadn't really considered any '10 years down the road' scenarios, so you've certainly given me food for thought on the subject. In the short term, all the art for my released game is available under OGA-BY on this site, in standard file formats ;)
Thursday, April 2, 2015 - 22:02
Not to mince word with Boogle but I would definitely lose the Ascii lines. To me it looks odd to have so much high res art surrounded by text borders. I would go with a bevelled windows or panes around everything with a light grey or brown fill.
Other than that, without knowing what all those icons are or do it's hard to comment on how well laid out it is, except to echo your own comment that it is very busy, lit up like a christmas tree really nails it.
i do think the bigger screen is a good direction but it does depend on what the gameplay is. If the game is mostly spent clicking things in the ui, then shrinking all the icons and what not might not be the right decision.
just my 2 cents...
Sunday, March 29, 2015 - 20:56
@mdwh:
> There used to be a problem that the CC summaries said nothing on this, but now they're pretty clear.
Clear in that they mention the 'technical measures' clause, not clear in that it's still easy to miss the fact that this covers some/most DRM systems.
I do agree that 'technical measures' is in a sense a better term, it's broader and encapsulates the idea better. But, as Lz_erk's post demonstrates, it's just a fact that people don't always make the leap from this term to DRM.
@Calinou: Sorry, yes you are correct. If you keep the derivative work private you do not have do anything with it. It's only if you release it publically as part of a game or otherwise, that you must make it available under the same license.
> "DRM free" is still proprietary software in most cases, thus the entire argument of how
> restricting DRM is to the freedom of the user is a bit moot.
This is an interesting point. In my case, I always encode all data files from my games using a custom (though pretty simple) bit scrambler and crc checker. This is to ensure the integrity of the files at run time. The idea is to make sure nothing's corrupted and prevent users from trivially cheating by twiddling config numbers or changing sprites or whatever. Even my case aside, it's really common for games to use propertiary file formats for their data (most because us gearhead programmers can always think of a 'better' way to store/load/format data ;)
I'm sure this could be construed as violating the 'technical measures' clause, if not in letter at least in spirit, since it makes it hard for users to access the work directly.
@Lz_erk: Well, that depends on what you mean by 'own' ;)
But generally speaking, no. OGA-BY 3.0 is identical to CC-BY 3.0 with the sole exception that the 'technical measures' clause has been removed.
If you release something as OGA-BY and someone uses them for a game they will not 'own' the pixels and they still must give credit to you as their creator. However, they will 'own' the pixels in the sense that they can redistribute them freely (and charge money for doing so) as part of their project. Still, again, they must give you credit and they cannot prevent you from redistributing the pixels as you see fit.
OGA-BY does lack a 'share alike' clause (CC-SA), meaning someone who creates derivative/new work from yours does not have to redistibute it publically, though they must still credit you as a contributing artist.
There is also a legitimate debate about whether distributing works in DRM'd systems 'removes' works from the public sphere or commons. Ex. suppose the OGA site disappears tomorrow and your hard drive crashes and you lose all backups of your work at the same time. Now suppose a dev is using your OGA-BY art in a game on a DRM'd platform. The dev is under no obligation to distribute the work sans DRM, so now your work is only available as a 'private' good. Kind of an extreme example, but hopefully it illustrates the idea (and it's actually not that far-fetched if you take a longer term view, like what about 10 years from now? 20 years from now? 50 years from now? etc). This is the sort of scenario that the 'technical measures' clause is meant to prevent. The idea is to ensure that the work will always stay 'free' or 'open'.
That's at least how I understand the point of the 'technical measures' clause. Since OGA-BY doesn't include this clause, choosing between CC-BY and OGA-BY is kind of a trade-off between ensuring the that work is forever free and making sure that it is maximally useful in today's world. Well, maybe others would put it differently, that's just my one line summary for you. ;)
Getting back to the original topic, you highlight /exactly/ the problem I see with how the licenses are presented on OGA. It's just not immediately obvious that 'technical measures' means 'no DRM', so it's too easy/common for artists to select CC-BY without realizing it restricts their work from being used on most commercial platforms today.
@bart: I know you are a busy guy, but no thoughts on how/if to address this issue?
@Dwapook: Calinou raises a good point. Overall, I would just say that I personally would not want to be caught in court trying to argue that a game on Steam is 100% DRM free, or more pointedly, that it in no way violates the CC-BY's 'technical measures' clause. For me, it's just a case of 'better safe than sorry'.
Interesting, pretty sure that is how my game functions on Steam. Steam just downloads the exe but you can run the game just fine w/o steam, and I'm pretty sure you could just copy the files around to run them elsewhere if you wished.
Somebody's summary of the different flavors of DRM on steam here:
I just want to say that I also think this would be a very useful feature. Actually, I'd like to see each work on here packaged as a '.zip' bundling all files in the submission along with a 'README.txt' file stating the author(s) and license(s) for the work as well as any attribution instructions. It'd be great to toss a copy of any of the relevant licenses (eg. CC-BY-3.0.txt', etc) in there too.
This is how I have packaged the works I have published on here and I think it makes a nice tidy bundle for anyone who downloads it. As it stands, it's very easy to download a bunch of pngs, etc. and completely lose track of who made them or how they are licensed. Similar to madmccoy, I have developed my own little system for keeping track of this stuff but it would be cool if the site automated the process a little since it has all the relevant information to do so.
Of course, I'm guessing such a process goes against the submission framework used by the site, but hey one can only dream right? maybe a stretch goal on the paetron?
@all: moving this thread to the 'feedback' forum, since that is the proper place for it, sorry for not realizing that in the first place.
@bart: no comment on this idea?
ps
if you are on vacay or just sick of talking about license stuff, I understand and sorry in advance for being a pest, but do I have warn you I plan to keep pinging here until I get a reply ;)
@all: Just to circle back to the original topic and close out this thread, I want to clarify that following surt's advice, I will refrain from pinging contributors about the difference between CC-BY and OGA-BY unless they explicitly mention being new to licensing or request help understanding the different licenses.
Per eugeneloza suggestion, I have opened a separate forum topic to discuss how to improve the licensing FAQ on OGA to help folks better understand the different licenses at the time of submission.
thanks all for your thoughts!
@claudeb: thanks for the pointer re: file formats, hadn't really considered any '10 years down the road' scenarios, so you've certainly given me food for thought on the subject. In the short term, all the art for my released game is available under OGA-BY on this site, in standard file formats ;)
Not to mince word with Boogle but I would definitely lose the Ascii lines. To me it looks odd to have so much high res art surrounded by text borders. I would go with a bevelled windows or panes around everything with a light grey or brown fill.
Other than that, without knowing what all those icons are or do it's hard to comment on how well laid out it is, except to echo your own comment that it is very busy, lit up like a christmas tree really nails it.
i do think the bigger screen is a good direction but it does depend on what the gameplay is. If the game is mostly spent clicking things in the ui, then shrinking all the icons and what not might not be the right decision.
just my 2 cents...
@mdwh:
> There used to be a problem that the CC summaries said nothing on this, but now they're pretty clear.
Clear in that they mention the 'technical measures' clause, not clear in that it's still easy to miss the fact that this covers some/most DRM systems.
I do agree that 'technical measures' is in a sense a better term, it's broader and encapsulates the idea better. But, as Lz_erk's post demonstrates, it's just a fact that people don't always make the leap from this term to DRM.
I think an astrix or otherwise with a call out the the DRM restriction and link to the 'Application of effective technical measures...' (https://wiki.creativecommons.org/License_Versions#Application_of_effecti...) would be a great addition to the OGA FAQ.
@bart: no interest in such a change?
@Calinou: Sorry, yes you are correct. If you keep the derivative work private you do not have do anything with it. It's only if you release it publically as part of a game or otherwise, that you must make it available under the same license.
@Julius:
> "DRM free" is still proprietary software in most cases, thus the entire argument of how
> restricting DRM is to the freedom of the user is a bit moot.
This is an interesting point. In my case, I always encode all data files from my games using a custom (though pretty simple) bit scrambler and crc checker. This is to ensure the integrity of the files at run time. The idea is to make sure nothing's corrupted and prevent users from trivially cheating by twiddling config numbers or changing sprites or whatever. Even my case aside, it's really common for games to use propertiary file formats for their data (most because us gearhead programmers can always think of a 'better' way to store/load/format data ;)
I'm sure this could be construed as violating the 'technical measures' clause, if not in letter at least in spirit, since it makes it hard for users to access the work directly.
@Lz_erk: Well, that depends on what you mean by 'own' ;)
But generally speaking, no. OGA-BY 3.0 is identical to CC-BY 3.0 with the sole exception that the 'technical measures' clause has been removed.
If you release something as OGA-BY and someone uses them for a game they will not 'own' the pixels and they still must give credit to you as their creator. However, they will 'own' the pixels in the sense that they can redistribute them freely (and charge money for doing so) as part of their project. Still, again, they must give you credit and they cannot prevent you from redistributing the pixels as you see fit.
OGA-BY does lack a 'share alike' clause (CC-SA), meaning someone who creates derivative/new work from yours does not have to redistibute it publically, though they must still credit you as a contributing artist.
There is also a legitimate debate about whether distributing works in DRM'd systems 'removes' works from the public sphere or commons. Ex. suppose the OGA site disappears tomorrow and your hard drive crashes and you lose all backups of your work at the same time. Now suppose a dev is using your OGA-BY art in a game on a DRM'd platform. The dev is under no obligation to distribute the work sans DRM, so now your work is only available as a 'private' good. Kind of an extreme example, but hopefully it illustrates the idea (and it's actually not that far-fetched if you take a longer term view, like what about 10 years from now? 20 years from now? 50 years from now? etc). This is the sort of scenario that the 'technical measures' clause is meant to prevent. The idea is to ensure that the work will always stay 'free' or 'open'.
That's at least how I understand the point of the 'technical measures' clause. Since OGA-BY doesn't include this clause, choosing between CC-BY and OGA-BY is kind of a trade-off between ensuring the that work is forever free and making sure that it is maximally useful in today's world. Well, maybe others would put it differently, that's just my one line summary for you. ;)
Getting back to the original topic, you highlight /exactly/ the problem I see with how the licenses are presented on OGA. It's just not immediately obvious that 'technical measures' means 'no DRM', so it's too easy/common for artists to select CC-BY without realizing it restricts their work from being used on most commercial platforms today.
@bart: I know you are a busy guy, but no thoughts on how/if to address this issue?
@Dwapook: Calinou raises a good point. Overall, I would just say that I personally would not want to be caught in court trying to argue that a game on Steam is 100% DRM free, or more pointedly, that it in no way violates the CC-BY's 'technical measures' clause. For me, it's just a case of 'better safe than sorry'.
Interesting, pretty sure that is how my game functions on Steam. Steam just downloads the exe but you can run the game just fine w/o steam, and I'm pretty sure you could just copy the files around to run them elsewhere if you wished.
Somebody's summary of the different flavors of DRM on steam here:
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/forums/showthread.php?10737-Can-someone-...
Wonder how it changes if you integrate Steamworks (acheivements, steam cards, etc) libraries into the game?
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